Jairdin Engen | Blogger
Hello to everyone reading this blog, and I hope you’re having a good month. So far October’s been a good month in terms of emerging entertainment, so hopefully you’ll be able to take advantage of some of October’s early bounty in the media world.
October 3: Super Smash Bros. 3DS
Super Smash Bros. (SSB) has been around since 1999, when it was released for the Nintendo 64, and has had two updated releases since. SSB 3DS is the fourth and is every bit as amazing as the previous installations. It’s available for the Nintendo 3DS–go figure–and is basically a beat-em-up using established Nintendo characters and some guest characters from other game series. There are single-player and multi-player modes, though it’s a lot more fun to beat up your friends’ characters than some computer-controlled people. There’s a bunch of other side modes, too, so if you get bored of watching Pikachu electrocute Mario you can go try those instead. I’ve only been able to play the demo, but I’m looking forward to picking up my (preordered) copy next time I go home.
October 7: The Flash
I’ve been on a bit of a superhero kick recently, so I was interested when I found out the CW was going to be making a new TV series based on the Flash, of DC Comics fame. This is following the success of the channel’s other DC Comics inspired series, “Arrow,” which aired the first episode of its third season the day after. The series follows Crime Scene Investigator Barry Allen after he gets hit from a lightning bolt that was supercharged by an explosion from a particle accelerator nearby. From what I’ve seen, the series is promising, with plenty of the action and troublesome secret identity issues that we expect from superheroes.
October 7: The Blood of Olympus
“The Blood of Olympus” is the fifth book of “The Heroes of Olympus” series, which is itself a follow up of the “Percy Jackson & the Olympians” series by Rick Riordan. In “The Blood of Olympus,” the demigods are trying to save the world from the Earth mother, Gaea, who intends to sacrifice two demigods in order to do… something. This is the fifth book in the series so it is probably a good idea to read the previous books to better understand what is going on, but if you enjoyed the “Percy Jackson & the Olympians” books (or movies) or you just like supernatural or fantasy sorts of things, it’s definitely something to check out.
October 10: Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
Hopefully you aren’t having a bad day, and if you are, I’m sorry. If you are having a bad day, a movie might be a good thing to make it better though, and “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day” is currently in Vista 3 Theaters here in Storm Lake. I know it sounds a bit cliché, telling you to try watching a movie about bad days on a bad day, but there really is nothing better for a bad day than watching other people have a bad day–at least in my experience. Good ol’ schadenfreude. Although if you want to think you’re having the worst day ever, you may not want to see it because Alexander and his family wind up dealing with things like crocodiles and runaway kangaroos in their bad day.
Anyway, hopefully something from the first 11 days of this month peaks your interest. If not, there are some pretty awesome things this week as well, including the season premiere of The Walking Dead which aired on Sunday, Oct. 12, so hopefully you got to enjoy that.
Thanks for reading,
Jairdin Engen
Graphic by Aaron Burns
